CITY HISTORY - HISTORIC FIGURES - BATTLE OF JONESBORO - BATTLE MAPS
Clayton County, which was created November 30, 1858 from Fayette and Henry Counties, was named for Judge Augustin Smith Clayton. He was born in Fredericksburg, Virginia, November 27, 1783. His parents moved to Augusta, Georgia when he was young and he studied at Richmond Academy.
While he was a student, Clayton made a speech for President George Washington. The President was so pleased he presented Clayton a copy of "Sallust" which is still in the possession of Clayton's descendants.
Clayton eventually entered Franklin College, now known as the University of Georgia. He studied law and was admitted to the Franklin County Bar in Athens. In 1808, he married Julia Carnes of Augusta. Clayton was selected by the legislature in 1810 to compile statutes of the state from 1800 to 1810. After serving in the General Assembly three years as clerk of the lower house, he was elected Judge of the Western Superior Court Circuit serving from 1819 to 1828. He was elected representative to Congress in 1832.
Judge Clayton voluntarily retired from Congress in 1835, returning to the practice of law in Athens. He had an attack of paralysis and died on June 21, 1839.
David Hugh Dickson
served on the Jonesboro City Council from 1935 through 1938. He took office as Mayor in
1939 and served through 1948. There was a four year break in his service during which the
city was ably served by Mr.Clarence E.Lamb, 1951 and 1952. Hugh Dickson took office again
in 1953 and remained through 1984.
The Name HUGH DICKSON was synonymous with Jonesboro and banking.
He retired from his position as vice president of First National Bank of Atlanta in 1969.
Having financial acumen from his long banking career, he made many wise decisions for the
city.
During Mayor Dickson's tenure, there were many progressive
accomplishments which have helped lead us to our present sound financial condition as a
city.
Colonel Samuel Goode Jones, for whom the city of Jonesboro, Georgia is named, was the elder son of Dr. Thomas Williamson Jones and was born at the residence of his great grandfather, Colonel Samuel Goode, in Mecklenburg County, Virginia, on September 20, 1815.
He received his early education at old Ebenezer Academy in Brunswick County, Virginia, and later attended Williams College in Massachusetts where he graduated with honors with the class of 1837. One of his classmates was the famous Northern General, "Fighting Joe Hooper."
After leaving Williams College he went to Newark, Delaware to complete his preparation for entering the active duties of his profession, civil engineering. At Newark College he studied under General William N. Pendleton, then professor of mathematics and later one of General Robert E. Lee's great lieutenants.
When young Jones finished the course, he was unable to secure a position in Delaware so he rode horseback to Richmond Virginia, where he met Honorable R. K. Mead, who secured for him a position as engineer on the James River and Kanawha Canal. He was the superintendent in charge of constructing the dam across the James River at the mouth of the Tye River. This was in March, 1838.
He moved to Georgia and Mr. L. N. Whittle of Macon, Georgia, invited young Jones to join him and helped him to get the position of assistant engineer on the Monroe Railroad, later known as the Macon & Western Railroad connecting Macon with Atlanta. Young Jones was engaged on the extension of the railroad between Forsyth and Atlanta, at that time called Marthasville. So capable and well did young Jones perform his duties that in 1841 he was made chief engineer of the Monroe Railroad and Banking Company.
On November 8, 1842 he was married at Hot Springs, Virginia to his first cousin, Martha Ward Goode. The young couple settled in Griffin, Georgia, where they, David Clopton ,and Robert Lanier, the father of the great Sidney Lanier, all newly married, lived together.
In 1844, Colonel Jone's eldest son, Thomas Goode Jones, was born at the house of Mr. L. N. Whittle, in Vineville, Georgia, now a part of the City of Macon. Thomas Goode Jones was a gallant soldier of the Confederacy during the war for Southern independence and at its close carried one of General Lee's flags of truce. After the war, he became a leading lawyer of Alabama and was later Speaker of the Alabama House of Representatives, Governor of Alabama twice, and United States District Judge.
A short time after the birth of Governor Jones, probably early in 1845, Colonel Jones and his wife moved to a little place on the railroad, then called Leaksville, about half way between Griffin and Atlanta. As a compliment to the young railroad builder, the name of the town was changed to Jonesboro.
Colonel Jones rebuilt the railroad between Macon and Atlanta and later moved to Atlanta. Later he surveyed and located the railroad between Columbus, Georgia and Barnesville. Later on Colonel Jones went to Tennessee and engaged in railroad construction. He returned to Georgia, engaged in building railroads but in 1849 was offered the position of engineer on the Montgomery and West Point Railroad.
In 1850 Colonel Jones moved his family to Montgomery, Alabama where he lived until 1867 when he moved to Lee County, Alabama, and in 1877 he moved to Sewanee, Tennessee. There he engaged in coal mining with Kirby Smith who had been a resourceful and gallant General in the Confederate Army. Colonel Jones surveyed the Nashville and Chattanooga Railroad, in Tennessee, the Montgomery and West Point Railroad, becoming its superintendent. He became president in 1867. He was also the chief engineer for the Alabama and Florida Railroad and before the end of 1862 he had run the road through to a connection with Pensacola, one hundred and twenty miles from Montgomery. This railroad proved a Godsend to the Confederate forces operating in that section of the country and was especially helpful to the Confederate Navy Yard at Pensacola in the transportation of supplies.
Samuel G. Jones was one of the pioneers in the industrial development of central Alabama. He was the chief organizer of the Chewalca Lime Works, one of the incorporators of the Montgomery and Talladega Sulphur mines which were opened just before the Civil War and which the Confederate Government afterwards utilized in the manufacture of sulphur.
Mr. Jones was deeply religious by birth and inclination and was a devoted and genuinely consistent member of the Episcopal Church, giving lavishly of his time and means toward its support. The first church service held by the Episcopalians of Atlanta was held in his home and was the beginning of the present St. Luke's Parish. He was ardent in his efforts to organize and support the University of the South, at Sewanee, Tennessee, and was one of the principal laymen who aided in establishing it. The sorrows and distresses of others moved him deeply and his purse was ever open to the needy and quick to relieve the suffering.
In politics he was an old line Whig, becoming a Democrat upon the disbandment of the former party. He always voted and never neglected his civic duties. He represented Lee County to the lower house of the Alabama Legislature 1872-1874 and was greatly respected for his ability and fairness.
Though not a Secessionist, he thought secession justifiable and essential to the honor of his state and he became ardent in his support of the Confederate government and gave generously of his time and means to the cause. At one time the greater part of his residence was converted into a hospital for the wounded
Confederates.
No man ever dealt more kindly with his slaves. He never sold one of his own and often-times, at the instance of husbands and wives , he would buy slaves to prevent a separation. His slaves were very fond of him and never more content than when performing some service for him. On one occasion a slave (Sarah Ann) whom he had carried North with him as a nurse, ran away and Mrs. Jones had to return home without her. Afterwards he received a pitiful appeal from her for aid to get back to him and his family. Mr. Jones sent her the money to return. persuasion from friends and neighbors he became a candidate for the
General Assembly of Tennessee. During the political campaign which followed, he was accused by his opponents, who knew of his great wealth in times gone by, of sympathy with the higher classes and indifference to the poor and their efforts to help themselves up. Refuting this charge, in what proved to be his last address to his friends and neighbors, at Winchester, Tennessee, on October 4, 1886, he narrated his early struggles, his success in middle age and the disasters which came upon him from the War and said: "I am in favor of raising the lower classes, the rich and the poor by education and kindly sympathy, rather than by bringing all to the lower level, and while it is true that I favor levelling society when I began, I want
to level men up - not down." This noble sentiment which he ever exemplified in his life was the last that passed his lips. A moment later the silver chord was loosed the golden bowl broken:
"God's Finger Touched Him And He Slept"
His funeral was held from the University Chapel at Sewanee and was largely attended by all classes; the rich and the poor, the high and the low, and all deeply mourned the passing of this splendid Christian gentleman .
Reprint from New Daily which was a Reprint from the July 2, 1943 issue of The "Clayton County News and Farmer"